An archaeology of the psychopath the medicalization of evil

Abstract

This chapter is concerned with the emergence of the psychopath as a psychiatric concept during the 19th century. It is argued that the reduction in medical credence in the notion of homicidal monomania resulted in a void in psychiatric expertise, which was ultimately filled by the medicalization of evil and the creation of the psychopath as a clinical entity. Through the transmission of philosophical and medical scientific theorizing, we can identify how issues of good and evil, right and wrong, and freewill and determinism allowed morality to become the major focus for the emerging psychiatric profession of that time. There is a wealth of literature both on moral philosophy and psychopathy that is not referenced in this chapter because (a) others have covered this in more detail elsewhere and (b) I merely wish to establish the overall principle of the possibility for the sake of argument. © 2006 Humana Press Inc.